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Justice of the peace records

Early development

The National Archives of Scotland (NAS) holds some record of Justices
of the Peace (JPs). JPs are local judges who deal with less important
crimes. They were introduced into Scotland by James VI in 1587 to
deal with "crimes and defaults in the second degree", especially
local disorders such as riot and feud. The office only established
itself in Scotland in the years 1609-11 and although the present JP
system can be said to date from 1661, JPs contributed little to the
court system of seventeenth-century Scotland and were never as important
as their English counterparts. They had limited powers and prestige,
were disliked as an English invention and were overtaken by developments
elsewhere in the Scottish legal system.

1707 to 1975

The revival of interest in justices following the Union of Scotland
and England in 1707 was due to the familiarity of the office to
the ministers of the English-led government. Despite the abolition
of heritable jurisdictions in Scotland in 1747, JPs continued to
play second fiddle in the counties to the older office of sheriff
- a situation that remains unchanged to this day. The JPs did enjoy
some successes, particularly through the issuing of liquor licences
from 1756 and the establishment of a nationwide system of small
debt courts from 1795. The JP system, however, was voluntary, unpaid
and seen as biased in favour of the justices' own interests. With
the ending of justices' jurisdiction over poaching during the 1860s,
the office went into decline and did not really revive until the
twentieth century.

The District Courts (Scotland) Act, 1975

This Act brought the JP courts into a new system of district courts
which also replaced the burgh police courts. The district courts deal
only with criminal cases such as assault, breach of the peace, theft
and road traffic offences. The records of the court are either held
by the courts or by local authority archives in Scotland, which also
hold some of the pre-1975 records of justices under license from the
National Archives of Scotland.

Powers of the Justices of the Peace

JPs had civil court powers and administrative functions as well as
criminal authority. Their civil duties included regulating the wages
and contracts of servants and labourers up to the end of the eighteenth
century, followed from 1795 by their heavy involvement with small
debt courts.

Administratively, the justices were also involved in various activities,
mainly the maintenance of roads and bridges, the banishment of vagrants
and the establishment of standard weights and measures. Some duties
such as special tax assessments and recruitment for the militia
were usually carried out in conjunction with other county officials.

Criminal cases before the JPs include minor assault, breach of peace,
irregular marriages, prostitution, riot, theft and the violation
of laws relating to excise cases, liquor licensing, poaching, roads
and (since 1932) juvenile court cases. As JPs were usually more
concerned to reduce local expenditure than to incur it, they tended
to fine rather than to imprison and the records of their criminal
hearings are usually brief.

The arrangement of JP Records in NAS

The JP records for each county and city are normally arranged in the
following order.

Section 1: Commissions of the peace, registers, lists of justices,
oaths, etc
Commissions may be to single JPs or for all JPs for part or whole
of a county or city. Oaths are usually of allegiance to the Crown
and sometimes include the oaths of constables (Orkney, 1826-1867:
JP34/1/1) who were the JPs' chief officials. The lists of justices
include some deaths and resignations (City of Glasgow, 1930-1971:
JP22/1/7).

Section 2: Minute books and records of quarter sessions
The quarter session minute books are the principal record of JPs.
As justices often met when other county business was to be discussed,
this section contains a broad range of material, some of which shades
into other types of county business and some of which is comparable
to papers found in the Miscellaneous section. There are membership
lists of masonic lodges (Aberdeenshire, 1784-1801: JP26/2/2); a
freeholders or electors' minute book (Lanarkshire, 1733-1774: JP16/2/19);
minute books of visiting committees (Stirlingshire, 1878-1911: JP19/2/3);
and a minute book of impressments for the army and navy (Perthshire,
1778-1795: JP20/2/6).
Section 3: Records of licensing courts
The records include applications, appeals, testimonials in favour
of applicants and records relating to the type of premise licensed
(such as a house, hotel or inn). Licensing records sometimes extend
to applications for game licences (Midlothian, 1861-1925: JP4/3/107)
or to premises allowed to hold explosives (Dumfriesshire, 1876-1889:
JP12/3/5-6).
Section 4: Court books
'Court books' include petty sessions to try small crimes and juvenile
courts to deal with young offenders. Such registers usually give
the parties' names, the charge, the date of trial and sentence,
standardly involving a fine or short spell of imprisonment. The
small debt courts flourished from 1795 with authority to hear cases
involving £40 scots, a limit raised to £8 sterling in
1825 but they were superseded by sheriff court small debt courts
by the mid-nineteenth century. The crossover nature of the JP records
is illustrated by a weights and measures court book (Midlothian,
1828-1851: JP4/4/110) and by fishing and game cases (Selkirkshire,
1840-1844: JP13/4/1) in the lists for these counties.
Section 5: Miscellanea
As its name implies, this section includes a diverse range of records.
For example, the list for Sutherland (whose arrangement of records
varies from most other courts) includes a militia list of 100 men
[c.1745] (JP32/7/1) and payments for the killing of foxes and eagles
in Strathnaver, Lairg, Farr, Reay and Skibo and elsewhere, giving
the claimants' names, time and place of killing and animals' ages,
1769-1804 JP32/7/5. Other types of papers - by no means an exhaustive
list - relate to: the JP clerk's letterbooks (East Lothian, 1827-1903:
JP2/5/1-4); amendments to highways and bridges (Peeblesshire, 1670-5:
JP3/5/2); excise case information (Inverness-shire, 1808-17: JP29/5/6);
cess or land tax arrears, (West Lothian, 1804-9: JP15/5/1); and
petitions of parents (City of Edinburgh, 1902 and 1920-44: JP35/5/3).

Types of JP sessions

Quarter sessions: The main meetings of JPs, the quarter sessions,
were meant to take place on specified days every three months but
as JPs usually wore several hats within their county, meetings were
left to their discretion, which in practice meant the JPs often met
when other types of county business were being transacted. Under an
Act of Parliament of 1741 quarter sessions had to be held at the head
burgh of a county.

General sessions: General sessions was the term given to any meeting
of the quarter session that was postponed (these meetings were allowed
to meet outside of the head burgh).

Special sessions: Meetings of the quarter sessions which were held
for a special purpose.

Petty sessions: Petty or ordinary sessions were meant to deal routinely
with minor crimes in their areas. After 1795, when JP small debt
courts were established, the practice of holding petty sessions
on a district basis within counties began to emerge. JP papers do
not survive in great quantities and searching should not be an onerous
task. Most justices were left to organise their meetings (known
as sessions) as they saw fit. This means that the frequency of JP
sessions varies from county to county. It also means that the principal
entries relating to civil, criminal and administrative matters will
usually be grouped together in the same volume rather than appearing
in separate registers.

The key to searching the JP collection is to look through all the
potentially relevant papers for the period you are researching, because
(1) the JP records are often not in any strict order and (2) are generally
not listed in detail. To take a single example, licensing cases for
Peebles during 1758-1808 (JP3/2/4) are recorded in the minute books
of the Peebles sessions and not in a separate licensing court record
as became the normal practice in most Scottish counties, including
Peeblesshire, during the nineteenth century (JP3/3/1). Occasionally,
some JP records find their way into sheriff court collections: try
the Miscellaneous section(s) first.

Covering dates and locations of JP records

NAS reference

County/city

Dates

Repository

JP1

Kirkcudbrightshire

1726-1974

NAS

JP2

East Lothian

1751-1974

NAS

JP3

Peeblesshire

1656-1974

NAS

JP4

Midlothian

1708-1975

NAS

JP5

Banffshire

1769-1974

NAS

JP6

Dumbartonshire

1728-1975

Glasgow City Archives

JP7

Renfrewshire

1834-1974

NAS

JP8

Berwickshire

1835-1965

NAS

JP9

Nairnshire

1803-1975

NAS

JP10

Morayshire

1712-1978

NAS

JP11

Ayrshire

1838-1975

NAS

JP12

Dumfriesshire

1748-1973

NAS

JP13

Selkirkshire

1745-1973

NAS

JP14

Roxburghshire

1760-1975

NAS

JP15

West Lothian

1752-1975

NAS

JP16

Lanarkshire

1733-1973

NAS

JP17

Wigtownshire

1746-1974

NAS

JP18

Clackmannan

1753-1974

NAS

JP19

Stirlingshire

1831-1974

Stirling Council Archives

JP20

Perthshire

1708-1959

Perth and Kinross Archives

JP21

Kinross-shire

1738-1975

Perth and Kinross Archives

JP22

Glasgow

1893-1974

Glasgow City Archives

JP23

Dundee

1894-1974

Dundee City Archives

JP24

Angus

1857-1975

Dundee City Archives

JP25

Kincardineshire

1751-1974

NAS

JP26

Aberdeenshire

1741-1974

NAS

JP27

Aberdeen City

1899-1971

Aberdeen City Archives

JP28

Fife

1798-1974

NAS

JP29

Inverness-shire

1808-1975

NAS

JP30

Ross and Cromarty

1890-1974

NAS

JP31

Caithness

1634-1973

NAS

JP32

Sutherland

1740-1968

NAS

JP33

Shetland

1748-1962

Shetland Archives

JP34

Orkney

1658-1968

Orkney Library and Archives

JP35

Edinburgh

1613-1967

NAS

JP36

Argyll

1798-1975

NAS

JP37

Bute

1796-1975

NAS

Contact details for all Scottish archive services can be found in
the directory of Scottish archives on the Scottish Archive Network
website.

Physical condition permitting, all the JP records are open to public
inspection.

Further reading

A Rosie, ed., 'Guide to the National Archives of Scotland' (The
Stationery Office, 1994), pp163-167

Johan Findlay, 'All manner of people: The history of Justices of
the Peace in Scotland' (Edinburgh, 2000)

Ann E Whetstone, 'Scottish county government in the 18th and 19th
centuries' (Edinburgh, 1981), Chapter 2